To Make A Ring
by codehappykid
Summary: The wizards and elves have departed from Middle-Earth. Much time has passed, and the race of Men now walks the Earth. But has Sauron truly been vanquished, even in this modern day and age? Let's see. (Only a little swearing)
1. Awakening

He woke up.  
He woke up in Central Park with a huge bump on his forehead.  
"Where am I?" he shouted. It was pointless to have shouted this. He shook his head from side to side, taking in the scene, and then got up off the grass.  
Nobody had paid any attention to him while he was asleep in the middle of Central Park. Once he had shouted, though, everybody had stopped to glance angrily in his direction. He looked around at everybody's stares and shrugged it off, walking casually out of Central Park and becoming a shadow amongst the myriad buildings.  
He thought about what had happened. The more he thought about it, the more ridiculous it got.  
"I had armies of darkness, magical artifacts, and the Ringwraiths. How the hell did I get beaten by someone named Frodo and the dimwitted bad luck of that blasted Gollum?" He kicked the side of a building, and it hurt his foot. He cried out in unexpected pain and began limping along his aimless path.  
"So this is it, then. I'm a Man, and it's much later. This isn't Middle-Earth. It doesn't matter, though. I will conquer this Earth and overrun it once more with my armies of darkness! Now, how to begin..." 


	2. A Familiar Inscription

Sauron strolled up and down the streets of New York City. Oh, the noise of the roads! He likened it to only one thing in his memory: that of the entire horde of Mordor shouting "Jimmy ate my sandwich!" all at once. He then wondered if he had indeed ever heard the entire horde of Mordor shouting such a thing. It didn't matter, anyway. They were all dead.  
"One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them, one ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them." Yes, he had once had that inscribed on his precious One Ring. It seemed silly now, however many years later it was. Yet there it was, printed in Elvish script upon the front of a building he had come to. It was a jewelry shop. Sauron pondered this. Had Men learned the arcane secrets of Ring lore and created so many Rings as to devalue them to the point of common merchants' wares, or were they just being stupid imitator bastards? He decided to walk into the shop and find out.  
"Merchant! I must question you."  
The owner stared blankly at this strange man in his shop for a second. His first thought was 'this guy is completely black. I mean, completely. Not black like black people black, but really really black. Does he even have eyes on that thing that's supposed to be a face?' His second thought was 'oh hell, it's New York.' He chewed his jaw a few times before replying.  
"Yeah? What you want? I'm busy."  
"I wish to know if you have mastered arcane Ring lore, or if these Rings you sell, which bear the inscription of ancient Mordor, are merely mockeries of the true One Ring I forged at Orodruin long ago."  
The owner's eyes widened slightly for a moment, then returned to their normal expression of ennui. He chewed his jaw some more.  
"You some kinda Tolkien freak?"  
Sauron was flabbergasted. "I know naught of this 'Tolkien'. Perchance you might direct me to a kiosk of some sort, wherein the information I seek may be storehoused?"  
The owner chewed his jaw.  
"There's a bookstore down the street. It's called Barnes & Noble. Try there."  
Sauron thanked the owner in formal style and turned about, leaving the jewelry shop in much the same spirit as the one he entered with. The owner muttered 'freak' under his breath as he went back to treating his customers. 


	3. The Bookstore Scene

Barnes & Noble was a magnificent bookstore. Sauron was impressed by it.  
"I am impressed by this," he said aloud as he entered. All the customers looked at him inquisitively. This was becoming a theme. A young girl pointed and laughed at him. He ignored her at that moment, knowing that when the armies of darkness overran the Earth once more, she would be turned into something. He didn't know what, but it would definitely not wear pink overalls and pigtails. He began browsing the bookstore.  
A large poster on a nearby bookstand caught his eye. He recognized the place that was depicted by it. The text of the poster proclaimed, "Lord of the Rings. Starts Dec. 19." He looked down at the books, and he saw the name "Tolkien."  
'This must be what the jewelry merchant spoke of,' he thought. Picking up a copy of The Fellowship of the Ring, he turned to the first page.  
"...what? Hobbits? Boring drivel."  
He flipped through several pages until the Black Riders made their entrance. He read those pages with absorbed attention, especially the stabbing of Frodo with the Morgul-knife. He cried, "Sheer poetry!" with tears in his eyes as he slammed the book shut and held it to his chest, face high as he sung the anthem of Mordor in the original tongue. Those who were in the bookstore stood watching in disbelief, while more and more people came to see what was going on. Soon, Sauron had an entire crowd gathered around him. When he finished the last notes of his song, the manager was standing next to him, an impatient, cross, pudgy little man in a white and magenta striped suit.  
"Can I HELP you?"  
"I'd like to buy this book, sir."  
The man pointed listlessly towards the counters. Sauron pushed through the slowly dispersing crowd and made his way to the front. A smartly dressed woman in her mid thirties greeted him less than pleasantly.  
"Can I see some form of I.D., please, sir?"  
"I.D.? I'm Sauron, the Lord of Mordor and creator of the One Ring! What kind of I.D. do you want?"  
"Look, buddy, you're not fooling anyone. What's your real name, and do you have any means by which you can prove that the government has verified this?"  
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN MY NAME'S NOT SAURON!?" He exploded with anger in the front of the store. "I carry with me the currency of Gondor, though it once burned me to speak its name! Does this prove my identification?"  
Sauron slapped all the Gondor coins in his pocket down on the counter. She picked up one of the coins and flipped it around twice, looking it over.  
"Where'd you pick these up, the World Fair?"  
"NO, you idiot! This is the authentic currency of Gondor! That's what I've been trying to tell you! I swear to you, when I reclaim my Dark Throne once again in Mordor, you will be transformed into a gill-less fish!"  
With that, Sauron reclaimed his pile of currency and stormed out of Barnes & Noble. 


	4. The Revolving Nazgul

The jewelry shop owner's eyes dully tracked him as he browsed the main display, as if attempting to bore a hole in stone by means of dripping water. This stranger wore a black hood and cloak that overshadowed his face and wrapped his entire body. The cloaked man slowly extended his arm towards the display, revealing his quivering hand, which was not cold, skeletal, or frightening in any sense. Finally, he picked up one of the many Rings that sat gleaming before him inside the glass case. He stood firmly in place, glancing nervously back and forth between the owner of the shop and the glittering golden Rings. His rasping, wraithlike voice chimed like a broken clock.  
"Sir? I need help."  
The owner meandered towards the stranger's location and asked what the problem was.  
"When I came into this shop, it was because I was drawn to the Ring. But now, I am drawn not only to the Ring I am holding, but also to the ones in the case. I am unable to move as a result."  
The owner chewed his jaw excessively for several minutes. There hung between them a silence whose awkward quality rivaled that of the duck-billed platypus.  
"Sir? If you don't do something soon, I may begin spinning around."  
"You're not a bright one, are you?"  
"I'm dark and evil and I serve the One Ring and my master Sauron, its forger."  
"Forgery's a capital offense."  
The owner started chewing his jaw again. The Wraith King, now human, followed his word and began to spin around, unsure of which Ring or Rings drew more heavily upon him. At that moment, another figure entered the shop. It took one look at the spinning Wraith King and slapped its forehead so hard that the original bump from earlier nearly opened.  
"You imbecile! Stop spinning around!"  
The Nazgul turned towards Sauron, and a horrifically cheesy grin breached his face.  
"By Hell, you've started smiling! DESIST! You look like Saruman puked up a cat!"  
The grin faded, and once again the face was shadowed in pure blackness.  
"That's better. Now look here. I exerted my will upon you for years, bending you to the power of the One Ring. You are deeply drawn to it, so much that you can sense its presence. You were psychologically battered until you craved only the Ring. Tell me, what in Hell are you doing here staring at imitations?"  
"I...was confused."  
"RIDICULOUS! You have passed through the Great Oblivion and returned, just as I have. If you weren't so single-minded in the previous life, you wouldn't be so psychologically screwed up now. You're here because your craving for the Ring lived on while your ability to sense its true presence faded. You saw the Rings and you entered this shop, and now you're...spinning in circles. Come with me."  
Sauron grabbed the Nazgul lord by the hand and dragged him out of the shop.  
The owner picked up and stared down the barrel of a revolver while chewing his jaw. 5 minutes passed.  
"...nah. Not yet." 


End file.
